The reports coming out of Israel are horrifying. The actions of Hamas in places like Kfar Aza are horrific as entire families were gunned down in their homes and babies decapitated.
The United Nations Secretary General issued a statement that “The attacks have so far claimed numerous Israeli civilian lives and injured many hundreds. The Secretary-General is appalled by reports that civilians have been attacked and abducted from their own homes.
“The Secretary-General is deeply concerned for the civilian population and urges maximum restraint. Civilians must be respected and protected in accordance with international humanitarian law at all times.”
The phrase “maximum restraint” is only used when terrorists kill Israelis and the UNSG gets worried that Israel will pursue the Palestinian Arab assailants. When terrorists kill people in other places including Pakistan, Iraq, Afghanistan or Nigeria, the UN Security Council declares “the need to hold perpetrators, organizers, financiers and sponsors of these reprehensible acts of terrorism accountable and bring them to justice.”
In light of the gross deformity of Palestinian culture and barbaric attacks by the popular political-terrorist party Hamas, it is time for Israel to pursue ‘maximum justice,’ to finish ALL “perpetrators, organizers, financiers and sponsors of these reprehensible acts of terrorism”, including the Islamic Republic of Iran if they were indeed behind the attacks.
Mohammed Deif, supreme military commander of Izz ad-Din al-Qassam BrigadesYahya al-Sinwar, current leader of Hamas in GazaIsmail Haniyeh, leader of Hamas based in Qatar
There are estimated to be 30,000 people affiliated with Hamas, not including those who aid and abet the group. Israel will require significant time to bring these murderers to maximum justice and rout them from the region. We should support Israel in destroying the terrorist entity and hopefully bringing calm to the region.
People around the globe are looking for ways to help Israel during this terrible time. Below are a few ways: Donate, Lobby, Support students, Rally, Pray. Stay informed.
Donation Dos and Don’ts
There are many organizations based in Israel which can be helpful and, unfortunately, many well-intentioned people who pour time and resources into bad ideas and scams.
DON’T give money or buy military supplies in the diaspora. It sounds illogical but there are several reasons.
The Israeli government has supplies which are consistent with how soldiers are trained and how it maintains equipment. It cannot accept and manage an odd helmet here and two night vision goggles there. It mucks up the military order.
It’s also illegal in most countries to send military supplies abroad.
DO send items. Socks, underwear, canned goods and the like are welcome and can be distributed to displaced people, soldiers, volunteers and others.
DONATIONS are welcome – to known entities. Beware of organizations which popped up overnight which might sound good but have no proven ability to direct 100% of the donations to people in need. Some good organizations in Israel include:
Friend of Israel Defense Forces (FIDF) to help soldiers
There are also organizations supporting college students who will be facing a barrage of anti-Israel attacks. Donate to organizations which help these students combat the amplified antisemitism and anti-Zionism that is growing every day:
StandWithUs helps students with training and materials
There are occasional one-offs who can help, such as The Jerusalem Great Synagogue which has set up The Emergency Fund supervised by Malcolm Hoenlein. The fund originally had roots in assisting lone soldiers in Israel and is now serving as a base to dynamically change the destination of contributions based on current need which Malcolm identifies and then gets approved by the donor before distribution.
The American Friends of The Jerusalem Great Synagogue is a United States tax exempt 501c3 charitable organization. Federal ID number: 23-7013128 Acct# – 096073694365 Acct Name: AMERICAN FRIENDS OF THE JERUSALEM GREAT SYNAGOGUE INC Acct Address: 3145 Coney island Avenue Brooklyn NY 11235 Bank Name: JPMorgan Chase Bank NA SWIFT Code: CHASUS33 Routing#: 021000021 Address: 270 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Phone Number: (866) 865-1388
The Importance of Lobbying
Israel is going to need persistent support, especially as the war continues and the number of Arab casualties rises. Politicians care about and track the calls and emails that come to their offices. Contact your local representatives, even if only sharing one or two sentences. Feel free to use any article on the FirstOneThrough site with politicians to amplify your voice.
Universities have become hotbeds of radicalism among socialists and Islamic extremists. The war will likely make campuses extremely hostile for anyone clearly Jewish, such as Orthodox men wearing kippahs.
In addition to donating to organizations like StandWithUs, contact your alma mater and let them know that antisemitism and support for Hamas are completely unacceptable. Contact fellow alumni who share your passion for the subject to create bulk power initiatives to confront any biases that might arise on campus.
Rally
There are many rallies taking place to support Israel. Go to your local synagogue or community center website or national organizations such as UJA putting one together October 10 at 5pm at the United Nations. People need to feel the bonds of community and discuss ways of supporting each other and the Jewish State at this difficult time.
Pray
Some people like to go to synagogue and pray. Some recite chapters of Tehillim / Psalms to pray for the wounded, hostages and families directly impacted. Others join global WhatsApp groups to show a global unity reciting prayers and Psalms together.
The prayers should help all of our positive actions have the desired effect of returning the hostages safely, healing the sick and injured, and deliver appropriate punishment to the evil perpetrators who inflicted such barbarity.
Stay Informed
There are many websites like Arutz Sheva and Jerusalem Post which will have the latest news, many of which will likely get targeted by Jihadists. The Palestinian Authority posts its propaganda at Wafa. For analysis which incorporates the various news feeds, historical context, actions of the United Nations and more, subscribe to the FirstOneThrough blog below.
In response to the heinous massacre of Israelis and kidnapping of an estimated 150 Jews, Israel’s Defense Minister Yoav Gallant announced a “complete siege [of Gaza]. We are fighting barbarians and will respond accordingly.” The siege is anticipated to include halting the supply of electricity, food, water and fuel as Israeli soldiers scour the region in search of innocent hostages.
For its part, Hamas announced that it would “respond to any targeting of our people who are safe in their homes without warning, with the execution of our civilian hostages, and we will broadcast it with audio and video.”
The United Nations Secretary General immediately took sides on the competing threats – one by Israel to halt supplies while it sought to redeem its captives, and the other by Hamas which threatened to execute the Jewish civilians and broadcast it to the world.
He sided with Palestinian terrorists. His statement read:
“I am deeply distressed by today’s announcement that Israel will initiate a complete siege of the Gaza Strip, nothing allowed in — no electricity, food or fuel. The humanitarian situation in Gaza was extremely dire before these hostilities; now it will only deteriorate exponentially.
“Medical equipment, food, fuel and other humanitarian supplies are desperately needed, along with access for humanitarian personnel. Relief and entry of essential supplies into Gaza must be facilitated and the UN will continue efforts to provide aid to respond to these needs.
“I urge all sides and the relevant parties to allow United Nations access to deliver urgent humanitarian assistance to Palestinian civilians trapped and helpless in the Gaza Strip. I appeal to the international community to mobilize immediate humanitarian support for this effort.”
That is not a misprint.
United Nations Secretary General Antonio Gutteres said that the UN would rally the world to ignore Israel’s search and rescue mission for Jewish hostages marked for public execution in Palestinian territory, and instead focus on Palestinian civilians who were “trapped and helpless” ruled by Arabs which they support and elected.
Bound Israeli female hostage pulled into Hamas jeep for Gaza
Blinded by its long-standing desire to help Palestinian Arabs, the United Nations has lost all legitimacy, and now participates in crimes against humanity and the murder of Israeli Jews.
The heinous massacre of Israeli Jews by the Palestinian political-terrorist group HAMAS meets every definition of a crime against humanity. The whitewashing of the evil source should therefore be considered a grave offense to be fought aggressively.
He flagged the “terrorist organization, Hamas” and called out terrorists a total of nine times and Hamas five times. He made it clear that the United States views the organization and its actions as evil with such declarations.
However, Biden misdirected the vitriol by constricting his language away from clearly labeling the group as the highly popular political party of Palestinian Arabs.
Worse, he made Palestinian Arabs appear as peace partners to stop the violence, saying “I’ve also directed my team to remain in constant contact with leaders throughout the region, including Egypt, Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Oman, the UAE, as well as with our European partners and the Palestinian Authority.“
CNN has done much the same calling out “Hamas fighters” and “Hamas militants” but disassociating the terrorist group with Palestinian Arabs. Instead, it limits the use of “Palestinians” to describe death tolls of local Arabs.
The New York Times echoes much of the narrative that Hamas is an “Iran-backed militant group that controls the Gaza Strip,” stripping the group of its Palestinian roots and nature and dressing it as a foreign implant.
This is toxic misinformation.
Hamas is the majority political party in Palestinian parliament, with 74 of the 132 seats, or 58 per cent of the total. According to a September 2023 Palestinian poll, “If new presidential elections were held today and only two candidates, Mahmoud Abbas [of Fatah] and Ismail Haniyeh [of Hamas], the voter turnout would be only 42%, and among those who would participate, Abbas would receive 37% of the vote and Haniyeh 58%,” showing the continued strength and popularity of the political-terrorist group.
The majority of Palestinians voted Hamas into power with the most antisemitic charter ever written, and a majority of Palestinian Arabs support the killing of Jews inside of Israel according to polls, just as Hamas has carried out.
Palestinian Arabs are engaged in a war to eradicate Jews from their homeland, and launched an attack on a Jewish religious holiday with a grisly crime against humanity. Efforts to recharacterize the war as stemming from a foreign-backed militant groups grossly paints Palestinian Arabs as twice-over victims – of Iranian-backed Hamas and of Israel – instead of squarely placing the root of evil on the local Arabs themselves.
The grisly crimes against humanity being waged by Palestinian Arabs against Jews must be fought militarily, financially, morally and with clarity. Hamas is the popular Palestinian political-terrorist party, not a foreign implant. Palestinian Arabs are responsible for the atrocities.
Write White House: “The grisly crimes against humanity being waged by Palestinian Arabs against Jews must be fought militarily, financially, morally and with clarity. Hamas is the popular Palestinian political-terrorist party, not a foreign implant.”
Before Israel declared itself an independent state in May 1948, “Palestinians” were a mix of Jews, Christians and Muslims. At the end of the 1948-9 Arab-Israeli War, the region was divided and renamed. There were Israeli Jews, Christians and Muslims, but no longer any “Palestinians,” as the non-Israeli territory fell under Egypt (Gaza) and The Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan (the west bank of the Jordan River). The term “Palestinians” for the United Nations came to only mean Arab refugees from Israel, who were then living either in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Gaza and Israel (the term Palestinian refugees inside of Israel was phased out by the global body in 1952).
Jordanians and subsequently, Former Jordanians
After Transjordan illegally seized control of the west bank of the Jordan River in 1949, it renamed itself as “Jordan”, now controlling both banks of the river. Jordan annexed that west bank land in 1950 and subsequently gave all the people who lived there – as long as they weren’t Jewish – Jordanian citizenship in 1954. These new Jordanians moved freely between both sides of the Jordan River and many opted to NOT take on the label of “refugee.” To wit, in June 1950, there were 506,200 refugees in Jordan, and that number shrank to 465,741 in June 1951, an 8% drop.
The new Jordanians were part of the force that attacked Israel in June 1967 and lost the eastern part of Jerusalem and all of the land Jordan illegally annexed in 1950. Jordan ultimately withdrew Jordanian citizenship from these West Bank Arabs in July 1988, when the Palestinians declared their independence, in a move not recognized by much of the world.
The former Jordanians are ruled by the Palestinian Authority, under the unpopular leadership of Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah. He has championed for more countries to recognize the Palestinian State and has secured the Muslim countries as well as several in Latin America. As the United States and western Europe have refused to recognize the country until it negotiates borders and other matters with Israel, they are viewed as stateless.
Meanwhile, Israel lifted the Jordanian ban on Jews living in the region. Israeli Jews now live throughout the area known as Area C, while they are still banned in Areas A and B under Palestinian Authority-control.
Hamas and Fatah have not been able to reconcile their differences over the past many years. Gaza remains an Islamic terrorist territory, and Areas A and B of the West Bank (handed by Israel to the Palestinian Authority) remain under control of the PA, for now. Should elections ever be held, it is likely that Hamas will win control of the PA and thereby take control of the former Jordanians in those areas.
One hundred years ago, “Palestinians” included a mix of Jews, Muslims and Christians living together. Today it means nothing. As Hamas controlled-Gaza and Fatah-controlled Areas A and B are completely distinct and there is no country of Palestine, the people should similarly be referred to differently, as Gazans and former Jordanians.
On November 29, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) condemned the sudden appearance of a “man-made cavity underneath the grounds of an UNRWA school in Gaza.” The agency “protested strongly to the relevant authorities in Gaza to express outrage and condemnation of the presence of such a structure underneath one of its installations.“
For the uninformed, the “man-made cavity” was a tunnel dug by the political-terrorist group HAMAS to store weapons and move their soldiers to attack and abduct Israelis. The “relevant authorities in Gaza” is the leadership of HAMAS.
But the words “Palestinian”, “Hamas”, “tunnels” or “terrorist” were completely absent in the otherwise strongly worded statement. It was as if UNRWA was only worried that a sinkhole might damage the structural integrity of their building.
UNRWA pretends that it is a neutral party to the conflict like the Red Cross, simply providing shelter, education and healthcare services inside the camps that it runs. The UNRWA statement made the point in closing with “UNRWA reiterates its demand that all parties respect the neutrality and inviolability of United Nations premises at all times. Such flagrant breaches of neutrality are serious violations of the Agency’s privileges and immunities, and they jeopardize the ability of UNRWA to provide support and protection to the 1.4 million Palestine refugees in need in Gaza.“
The reality is that UNRWA is not neutral. It frequently leaves its jurisdiction to investigate Israel. It specifically calls out Israel by name, while not doing so for Palestinians.
A recent example was UNRWA’s condemnation of Israel evicting Arab squatters in Israeli-owned homes in the Sheik Jarrah section of Jerusalem. That neighborhood lies outside UNRWA’s jurisdiction and purview.
A few weeks ago, UNRWA joined with several other UN agencies to go to Beit Iksa in Area B of the West Bank, near the Israeli town of Mevaseret Zion. It joined Palestinian farmers in an olive harvest – again, nothing to do with its mission and far outside of so-called “refugee camps.”
Meanwhile, when Palestinian children lost their lives in Syria from playing with dormant bombs lying on the ground from the civil war, UNRWA bemoaned the loss of life but only mentioned that the children were victims of the generic “conflict” without blaming the government of Syria.
Yet when a Palestinian man was hit by an Israeli army truck in a small town southeast of Hebron, no where near an UNRWA facility, UNRWA “condemned” Israel saying it showed “evident disregard for their responsibilities vis-à-vis internal law and standards.“
Supporters of Hamas in the Jabalia refugee camp in Gaza, gather to express their solidarity with the Jenin refugee camp, against the Israeli operation in Jenin to root out Palestinian terrorists who killed three civilians in Tel Aviv on April 10, 2022. A few weeks later, the head of UNRWA went to Jenin to show his support for Palestinian Arabs in Jenin. (Photo by MOHAMMED ABED / AFP)
When UNRWA lambasts Israel far from its field of operations but refuses to clearly condemn Hamas and its terrorist tunnels abutting its facilities, it further underscores that the agency is not neutral and therefore deserves neither privileges nor immunities.
In November 2021, the United Kingdom took the long overdue step of recognizing the entirety of the Palestinian Arab group HAMAS to be a terrorist organization. In making the decision to mark the ‘political wing’ as no different than its ‘military wing,’ British Home Secretary Priti Patel said “Hamas is fundamentally and rabidly antisemitic” and that the group has “significant terrorist capability, including access to extensive and sophisticated weaponry, as well as terrorist training facilities.“
This has long been plain to see for anyone who read the group’s foundational charter which includes such noxious declarations as “Our struggle against the Jews is very great and very serious” and “In face of the Jews’ usurpation of Palestine, it is compulsory that the banner of Jihad be raised“, “Israel, Judaism and Jews challenge Islam and the Moslem people,” and “Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it.”
The immediate ramification of the British action is to make it illegal to be a member of Hamas or to express support for the group, including by flying its flag or wearing a T-shirt to that end. The maximum penalty would be 14 years in prison.
But the impact should have much greater consequences.
By recognizing that the entirety of Hamas is a rabidly antisemitic terrorist group, it marks the Gaza Strip, which is administered by Hamas, as a terrorist enclave. It is a new term that needs to be properly institutionalized as an expansion of established governmental terms like Foreign Terrorist Organizations, State Sponsors of Terrorism and Terrorist Safe Havens.
Hamas winning parliamentary elections in 2006Hamas meeting with Taliban to congratulate them for expelling western forces in 2021Masked Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip, March 2008. (AP Photo/Khalil Hamra)Hamas drags a suspected ‘collaborator’ through the streets of Gaza in 2012Hamas schools and camps train children to kill JewsHamas is a terrorist organization which runs the Gaza Strip from which it has launched repeated wars and terrorist attacks
The United States had long ago marked Hamas as a foreign terrorist organization (FTO), along with other Palestinian groups operating out of Gaza including the Palestine Liberation Front (PLF), Palestine Islamic Jihad (PIJ), Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and the PFLP-General Command (PFLP-GC). The list of Palestinian Arab groups hell-bent on killing Jews is long and the designation enabled the government to block funding of such terrorists and to block their assets with EO 13224 of 2001. Subsequent amendments to that executive order limited the travel of members of these groups, and enabled monitoring agencies to track their activities with the support of numerous western countries including the United Kingdom, Australia and Switzerland.
The U.S. State Department similarly maintains a list of countries which are State Sponsors of Terrorism, including Cuba, North Korea, Iran and Syria. These countries are subject to a variety of sanctions.
State also recognized the threat of terrorist safe havens in its reports which defined them as “ungoverned, under-governed, or ill-governed areas of a country and non-physical areas where terrorists that constitute a threat to U.S. national security interests are able to organize, plan, raise funds, communicate, recruit, train, and operate in relative security because of inadequate governance capacity, political will, or both.” These locations enable terrorist to operate freely, threatening civilized society at any time they choose.
In summary, the U.S. government identifies terrorists, countries that support terrorists, and areas that enable terrorists to flourish. But Gaza, governed by Hamas (an FTO) and supported by a state sponsor of terrorism (Iran), doesn’t exactly mean the criteria of a “terrorist safe haven” because it HAS the political will and directive to commit terrorism. As such, it sets a new low water market in depravity and requires a new category designation: a terrorist enclave.
Actions Against Terrorist Locations
The U.S. State Department developed “Long-term Programs and Initiatives Designed to Counter Terrorist Safe Havens and Recruitment.” Its stated goals include “protecting the United States, our interests, and our allies by reducing the ability of terrorists to radicalize, recruit, mobilize, and inspire acts of terrorism.” But the department has been seemingly tepid in taking forceful actions.
In response, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) produced a plan in 2011 as it noted that the State Department had “multiple reporting requirements,” but failed to provide a “list of its efforts to address terrorist safe havens.” Therefore, the GAO took the important step to “identif[y] eliminating safe havens as a priority action against which all elements of national power – including military, diplomatic, financial, intelligence, and law enforcement – should be applied.”
One of the most important resources to extremists is safe haven. Safe havens provide the enemy with relative freedom to plan, organize, train, rest, and conduct operations.
U.S. Department of defense, national military strategic plan
The United States has long understood that Hamas is a terrorist group supported by state sponsors of terrorism. It is therefore past time to label the Hamas fiefdom of Gaza as a terrorist enclave, and to develop a comprehensive set of actions against this noxious hotbed of extremists.
UNRWA, the controversial UN agency which is solely devoted to the descendants of Palestinian refugees and other local people, held a two day fundraising appeal which began on November 16, 2021. Led by the governments of Jordan and Sweden, they appealed to countries around the world to donate to a temporary agency which was established in 1949.
According to UNRWA, it serviced 5.7 million refugees and 685,000 other people (mainly poor people and those married to descendants of refugees) in the five fields of operation. That means that 10.7% of the UNRWA’s wards are not refugees, even under the exaggerated definition that UNRWA uses. In the West Bank, the numbers are even more stark, where 19.5% of the UNRWA base are “others.” Many of these extra clients are poor Arabs in Jerusalem, as noted in the fine print of the UNRWA report.
UNRWA added services to thousands of poor Arabs in the eastern portion of Jerusalem, resulting in an inflated 19.5% of UNRWA wards in the West Bank being “others” compared to just 10.2% in Gaza.
As evidence of distortion in the West Bank, there are very few students relative to the population, especially compared to Gaza. While the percent of the population below 14 years old is high in both locales at 35.3% and 42.5% in the West Bank and Gaza, respectively, (and 17.4% and 18.0% for 15-24 year olds) only 4.2% of UNRWA’s West Bank wards are in UNRWA schools, while the figure is 17.4% in Gaza – four times the rate! That’s because children in the West Bank have many more options and prefer to stay away from UNRWA’s schools.
UNRWA services 287,000 students in Gaza but only 46,000 in the West Bank. The youth in the West Bank prefer using non-UNRWA schools because they have a choice while there are few options in Gaza.
Despite UNRWA’s schools being unpopular in the West Bank, the agency continues to hire. The pupil-to-student ratio was 20, in sharp contrast to 30 students per teacher in Gaza.
The US Ambassador to the UN may be in on the joke as she tweeted during her visit to a UN school on November 17: “Today, I met with educators and students at Jalazone @UNRWA Girls School in Ramallah. I was inspired by their stories and dreams for the future, and I spoke to UNRWA officials about how to make their work stronger, more efficient, and more accountable.“
Moves of UNRWA to Jerusalem and Wards to Statelessness
For the period of January 1, 2012, UNRWA began to break out the “other” category for the first time. It was also the last year that it published the annual report from Gaza. Starting the following year – a year which saw the US Democratic Party yell at its national convention that it no longer considered Jerusalem as the capital of Israel – it began to publish its report in Jerusalem, as noted at the bottom of the reports.
Over the nine years since this breakout started, the refugees in the West Bank grew from 727,471 to 871,537, a growth of 20%, while the other wards grew from 147,156 to 211,116, a 43% jump – over twice the rate. The situation was even more dramatic in Jordan, where the UNRWA refugee population grew 17% while the other category grew by a whopping 130%. It’s not hard to speculate that people married in to get free services from UNRWA, and the fat agency could funnel cash and services to actual refugees from the Syrian civil war who flooded into Jordan.
The majority of UNRWA’s clientele actually had Jordanian citizenship from the time the agency was founded until 1988. Jordan illegally annexed what is now commonly called the “West Bank” in 1950 and gave all the Arabs there citizenship. Many Arabs moved back-and-forth between Jordan and the West Bank (both part of the original Palestine Mandate) until 1967 when it became harder to do so after Jordan (and West Bankers) attacked Israel and lost the region. Jordan continued to give those Arabs Jordanian citizenship until it withdrew it abruptly in July 1988, making these Arabs stateless.
A total of 55.5% of UNRWA wards would still be Jordanians had the king not removed their citizenship.
Staffing
In 2000, UNRWA had a staff of 22,447 to address a population of 3,806,055, or a staff member for every 170 registered persons. At the end of 2020, the staff was down from immediate prior years due to the Trump administration cutbacks, but up overall to 28,563 staffers for 6,388,887 people, or one staffer per 224 people. By way of comparison, in 2020 the UNHCR global refugee agency had to deal with 76.7 million people fleeing wars far from their homes requiring brand new housing and schools, was staffed by only 17,300 people, or a staffer for every 4,433 real refugees.
UNRWA has operated in the exact same geography with the same people speaking the same language for decades but still has a staff that is 20x the size proportionately of UHCR which has to handle real refugees fleeing across the world requiring everything new.
Summary
UNRWA is grossly over-staffed, especially relative to the global refugee agency that really does need the resources. It inflated its mandate by adding nearly 11% new people to its roster and moved its center to the contested city of Jerusalem and began servicing eastern Jerusalem’s poor Arabs, making the agency yet more politicized. Further, in terms of competence, UNRWA has shown that it is unable to attract students to its schools.
One needn’t look to news stories and editorials about UNRWA’s supporting anti-Semitism, harboring and employing terrorists, redefining “refugees,” extending its mandate and hearing how Arabs are deregistering from UNRWA to realize how disastrous it is. The agency’s own numbers make clear that it is inept and past time to be shut down.
The United Nations, liberal media and politicians are bemoaning the Israeli and Egyptian blockade of Gaza, arguing that it is a form of “collective punishment” and is creating an economic disaster in the small coastal enclave. Those articles and arguments all fail to describe why the blockade exists and why it is essential for it to continue.
The landside blockade of Gaza began in June 2007, shortly after the political-terrorist group Hamas ousted its rival Fatah from the area. A naval blockade went into effect in January 2009 to further clamp down on the region, after the December 2008-January 2009 war against Israel launched by Hamas.
Ruled by a Terrorist Organization
Hamas is an extremist Islamist terrorist organization sworn to Israel’s destruction and the murder of Jews. It is a designated foreign terrorist organization by the United States and many western countries. Its 1988 founding charter is the most anti-Semitic political document of the modern age, a combination of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf and the Russian forgery, Protocols of the Elders of Zion.
Palestinian Arabs elected Hamas to a majority of the Palestinian parliament in 2006. The organization calls for the destruction of Israel in any form and calls for a global jihad against the Jewish State.
Repeated Warsfrom Gaza
Hamas has launched wars from Gaza against Israel in 2008, 2012, 2014 and May 2021. When not sending missiles all over the Jewish State, it launches arson balloons to burn Israeli fields, digs tunnels into Israel to abduct Israelis, and attempts to destroy the separation fence and infiltrate Israel.
Gazans Want To Kill Israeli Civilians
The Anti-Defamation League did global polls in 2014 and 2015 and found the Palestinian Arabs were by far the most anti-Semitic in the world, with 93% of the population harboring anti-Jewish attitudes. However, while almost every Palestinian Arab is anti-Semitic, the Gazans and West Bankers have different views about physically attacking Israeli civilians.
The gap in attitude between Gazans and West Bankers about violently attacking Israeli civilians inside of Israel has continued to grow (source: Palestinian PCPSR polls)
Palestinians poll themselves every quarter about their attitudes on a variety of topics. One of the questions asked each poll is “Concerning armed attacks against Israeli civilians inside Israel, I…” with choices ranging from “strong support”, “support” to “oppose”, “strongly oppose” and “I don’t know.” The fact that the poll asks such question says a lot about Palestinian society generally, but an analysis of the trend in the chart above is important.
Between 2001 and 2008, the attitudes among Gazans and West Bank Arabs were much the same, with Gazans preferring killing Israeli civilians inside of Israel by an average of 11.6% more than West Bankers. After the 2008-9 Gaza war and the implementation of the naval blockade, the gap in attitudes widened. Between 2009 and 2017, Gazans preferred attacking Israeli Jews inside of Israel by a gap of 22.1%, almost double the 2001-8 period. Between 2018 and today, the gap has become even more pronounced, with Gazans voting for violence by a difference of 43.9%, nearly doubling again. Further, after the 2014 and May 2021 wars, Hamas’s popularity soared as did the uptick in Gazans desire to see more Jewish blood.
The difference in attitude is stark and the sentiment is frightening. And it is not theoretical.
In March 2011, after a the horrendous slaughter of a family of five by Palestinian Arabs in the West Bank, Gazans celebrated the murder (51.0%) while West Bank Arabs did not (75.6%).
Palestinian poll taken shortly after slaughter of Fogel family in Itamar, including an 11 year old, 4 year old and 3 month old, all stabbed to death.
This attitude was not an outlier. In August 2019, Palestinian Arabs blew up a 17 year-old girl, Rina Shnerb, while she was on a family hike. Over 80% of Gazans supported the attack.
Palestinian poll taken shortly after bomb blew up and killed Rina Shnerb.
It is hard to imagine that there are any places in the world where there would be any support for stabbing to death a 3 month old lying in its crib, or for blowing up a 17 year old girl going on a nature hike. But in Gaza, the MAJORITY support the slaughter of innocent Jews.
For people who want to counter and prevent violent extremism, and who care about peace, justice and the sanctity of human life, it is well past time to pull all support from the terrorist enclave of Gaza, including shutting UNRWA in the area. Human rights and decency demand it.
Islamists and leftists often refer to Hamas by the group’s preferred tagline as a “resistance force,” softening the organization’s anti-Semitic and genocidal core. Fortunately, Western countries are not following suit.
On May 17, 2021, the Organization of American States (OAS), stated unequivocally that Hamas is a terrorist group that targets civilians which “makes the invocation of the principle oflegitimate defense by Israel essential.“
The OAS constitutes 35 nations in North and South America, every country in the region with the exception of Cuba. The United States had previously categorized Hamas as a foreign terrorist organization (FTO) in 1997, along with other Palestinian Arab terrorist groups. Antigua objected to the recent OAS designation.
Further east, the European Union confirmed that Hamas is a terrorist group in 2019. Hamas had tried to overturn the designation claiming it’s a democratically-elected political party, which is true but has nothing to do with it’s homicidal and destructive actions and statements; it just says more about Palestinian Arabs who elected the group to 58% of its parliament. Hamas is eager to be taken off the terrorist list to ease the flow of funds into its coffers.
Not one news agency – Reuters, Associated Press, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal – reported on the fact that entire western world has woken up to the evilness of Hamas. Instead, the mainstream media continues to report on the dire need of funding to rebuild Gaza from its self-inflicted situation, as they pivot to a jaundiced pro-Palestinian narrative from accurately reporting the news.
New York Times articles on June 18, 2021 depicting Israelis as “far-right” and the Israeli police as “violent” abusers, compared to Hamas being simply “militant” as Palestinians “wait for normalcy,” while homeless. No clarification that Israel and Egypt’s blockade only began after the terrorist group took over Gaza, nor that Palestinians support the terrorist group.
First One Through 